What Is Meaningful Use

Meaningful use (MU), in a health information technology (HIT) context.

Meaningful Use Stage 1

Meaningful use stage 1 is the first phase of the United States federal government’s .

Meaningful Use Stage 2

The 2014 Edition S And CC final rule completes the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology’s.

Meaningful Use Stage 3

Meaningful use stage 3 is the third phase of the meaningful use incentive program which details the third section.

Meaningful Use Resources

The U.S. Department of Health And Human Services (HHS) has resources in place to help health care providers.

الاثنين، 10 ديسمبر 2012

Meaningful Use Stage 1

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Meaningful use stage 1 is the first phase of the United States federal government’s meaningful use incentive program, which details the requirements for the use of electronic health record (EHR) systems by hospitals and eligible health care professionals.
The list of criteria and regulations was established by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) and the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT  (ONC) in July 2010.
Consisting of 25 total criteria, the list for meaningful use stage 1 is broken into 15 core requirements and 10 menu requirements. All core requirements are mandatory, while health care providers can choose five of the 10 menu requirements to meet.
Within the confines of meaningful use stage 1, all eligible parties must adopt an EHR that meets the listed criteria by the end of 2014 in order to be eligible for government incentives. In order to receive the maximum incentive, providers must have achieved meaningful use for at least 90 days by the end of the 2012 federal fiscal year (September 30, 2012).
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Meaningful Use Stage 3

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Meaningful use stage 3 is the third phase of the meaningful use incentive program which details the third section of requirements for the use of electronic health record (EHR) systems by hospitals and eligible health care professionals.
Along with meaningful use stage 1 and meaningful use stage 2, the third list of criteria and regulations is being established by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) and the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT (ONC).
While the process of establishing criteria is in progress for stage 2, stage 3 remains more of a mystery, as only a handful of criteria have been proposed. Meaningful use stage 3 is likely to follow the same format as its predecessors, with a divide between core (mandatory) and menu (optional) requirements, continuations of stage 1 and stage 2 requirements and addition of some new requirements.
The commencement of meaningful use stage 3 will be announced at a later date.
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الثلاثاء، 4 ديسمبر 2012

What Is Meaningful Use?

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Meaningful use (MU), in a health information technology (HIT) context, defines the use of electronic health records (EHR) and related technology within a healthcare organization. Achieving meaningful use also helps determine whether an organization will receive payments from the federal government under either the Medicare EHR Incentive Program or the Medicaid EHR Incentive Program.
According to the provisions of the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act of 2009,organizations that are eligible for the Medicare EHR Incentive Program and achieve meaningful use by 2014 will be eligible for incentive payments; those who have failed to achieve that standard by 2015 may be penalized. To receive the maximum reimbursement, physicians and hospitals must achieve stage 1 of meaningful use of EHR for at least a 90-day period within the 2011 or 2012 federal fiscal year and for the entire year thereafter.
Those eligible for the Medicaid program must demonstrate meaningful use by 2016 in order to receive incentive payments.
The Centers for Medicare Medicaid Services (CMS) worked with the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT and other parts of Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to establish regulations for stage 1 of the meaningful use incentive program.
The working group will also establish criteria to determine stages 2 and 3 of meaningful use. Criteria for stage 2 of meaningful use, which will begin in 2014, have been proposed and are expected to be finalized in early 2012. Criteria for stage 3 of meaningful use will be defined at a later date.
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HITECH Act (Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act)

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What is Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act (HITECH Act)?
The Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act (HITECH Act) legislation created to stimulate the adoption of electronic health records (EHR) and supporting technology in the United States. President Obama signed HITECH into law on February 17, 2009 as part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA), an economic stimulus bill.
The HITECH act stipulates that, beginning in 2011, healthcare providers will be offered financial incentives for demonstrating meaningful use of electronic health records (EHR). Incentives will be offered until 2015, after which time penalties may be levied for failing to demonstrate such use. The Act also establishes grants for training centers for the personnel required to support a health IT infrastructure.
HITECH Act regulations are here to stay.
Tips for updating IT operations following the HITECH Act.
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Radiological Society of North America (RSNA)

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Radiological Society of North America (RSNA) is a society of radiologists and similar health scientists that seeks to encourage connections between colleagues and provide scientists with a platform for radiology education and research.
The RSNA runs an annual scientific meeting and tradeshow every winter that publicizes new research and advances in the field of radiological technology.  Many of the technologies and vendor partnerships unveiled at these shows have to do with mobile and electronic healthcare. These include GE Healthcare‘s Centricity OneView, software that integrates medical applications, or the partnership that uses the LifeImage Inc. Web services to send radiology images from physicians to the Microsoft HealthVault personal health record (PHR) service.
The RSNA also publishes a number of trade journals about radiology, including Radiology (a monthly publication focused on the latest research), RadioGraphics (a journal of peer-reviewed material presented at the annual RSNA meeting) and RSNA News (a monthly newsletter to keep RNSA members informed of RSNA happenings).

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الاثنين، 3 ديسمبر 2012

Meaningful Use Resources

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Meaningful Use Resources to Get Started

The U.S. Department of Health & Human Services (HHS) has resources in place to help health care providers make informed decisions about adopting and meaningfully using EHRs.

Registration for Medicare and Medicaid EHR Incentive Programs

Talking to Your Patients about EHRs

Benefits of EHRs

Meaningful Use Final Rule

Meaningful Use Attestation

The Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT along with the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services have compiled a list of Electronic Health Record products used for the attestation of Meaningful Use under the CMS Medicare and Medicaid EHR Incentive Program. The file containing this data is in a csv format and is updated monthly. In addition, a data dictionary is provided that describes the variables available in the dataset. Finally, a factsheet is offered to explain how the data is generated and how to best use it.
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Clinical Quality Measures

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Clinical Quality Measures

Quality health care is a high priority for President Obama, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), the Centers for Medicare ∓ Medicaid Services (CMS), and the Office of the National Coordinator of Health Information Technology (ONC). CMS uses clinical quality measures (CQMs) in a variety of quality initiatives that include quality improvement and public reporting. ONC certifies that electronic health record (EHR) technologies are capable of accurately calculating the CQM results for the meaningful use incentive program.

Meaningful Use Clinical Quality Measures for 2013

Eligible Professionals (EPs) will continue to report from the 44 measures finalized for Stage 1 and
Eligible Hospitals (EHs) and and Critical Access Hospitals (CAHs) will continue to report from the 15 measures finalized for Stage 1.
In 2013, there are two reporting methods available for reporting the Stage 1 measures:
  1. Attestation
  2. eReporting Pilots: (Physician Quality Reporting System EHR Incentive Program Pilot for EPs eReporting Pilot for EHs and CAHs)

Meaningful Use Clinical Quality Measures for 2014 and Beyond

All providers are required to report on CQMs in order to demonstrate meaningful use. Beginning in 2014, all providers regardless of their stage of meaningful use will report on CQMs in the same way.
  • EPs must report on 9 out of 64 total CQMs.
  • EHs and CAHs must report on 16 out of 29 total CQMs.
In addition, all providers must select CQMs from at least 3 of the 6 key health care policy domains recommended by HHS's National Quality Strategy:
  • Patient and Family Engagement
  • Patient Safety
  • Care Coordination
  • Population and Public Health
  • Efficient Use of Healthcare Resources
  • Clinical Processes/Effectiveness 
A complete list of the 2014 CQMs, along with their associated National Quality Strategy domains, usage guides, release notes, fact sheets, etc. are available at: http://www.cms.gov/Regulations-and-Guidance/Legislation/EHRIncentivePrograms/2014_ClinicalQualityMeasures.html

Quality Measure Code Sets

The Clinical Quality Measures used by the HHS EHR incentive program are comprised of definitions, measure logic, data elements, and value sets. Four federal agencies: the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ), CMS, the National Library of Medicine (NLM), and ONC are providing these components in various formats in order to be understood by technical, non-technical, and clinical consumers. The Value Set Authority Center will provide downloadable access to all official versions of vocabulary Value Sets contained in CQMs that support Meaningful Use Stage 2.
Data Elements Catalog (DEC) – A data element is a representation of a clinical concept that represents a patient state or attribute. This may be a diagnosis, lab value, gender, etc. that is encoded using standardized terminologies. The DEC is maintained by NLM and available through the Value Set Authority Center (VSAC).
Value Sets – Value sets define clinical concepts unambiguously. They provide list of numerical values and the individual descriptions from standard vocabularies used to define the clinical concepts (e.g., diabetes, clinical visit) within the quality measures. NLM maintains the value sets with the Value Set Authority Center.
USHIK – The United States Health Information Knowledgebase (USHIK) is AHRQ's portal for Meaningful Use. The USHIK is intended as a one-stop shop for publically accessing the components of meaningful use quality measures, providing technical specifications including definitions, measure computation logic, data elements, context, version comparisons, and value (code) sets. Measures and value sets are available in Excel, PDF, XML, and SVS.
Note: Viewing and/or downloading Meaningful Use proprietary value sets, such as those including CPT codes or SNOMED CT codes from NLM-VSAC or AHRQ-USHIK, requires a free Unified Medical Language System® Metathesaurus License (UMLS). Authentication via an UMLS ID and password is obtainable through the National Library of Medicine.

Certification

The ONC Certification Program provides a defined process to ensure that EHR technologies meet the adopted standards and certification criteria to help providers and hospitals achieve Meaningful Use objectives and measures established by CMS. Eligible professionals and eligible hospitals that seek to qualify for incentive payments under the Medicare and Medicaid EHR Incentive Programs are required to demonstrate meaningful use of certified EHR technology. For more information on the ONC Certification Programs, please visit http://www.healthit.gov/policy-researchers-implementers/certification-programs-policy
Certification of EHR technologies under the ONC certification program requires that EHR software products and EHR modules be tested, as applicable, for the capability to accurately and appropriately calculate the CQM results. ONC has commissioned the development of the Cypress certification tool. The process for submitting the Cypress tool for official approval to be used in the ONC Certification Program is currently under way. http://www.healthit.gov/cypress
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